Image NASA/ The Aviation Herald
How tight-lipped can air accident investigators be? Try this:
The BEA (Bureau d’Enquetes et d’Analyses, the French air accident investigator) has launched an investigation into the event that occurred during AF 445 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, during the night of November 29 2009, to the A330-203 operated by Air France. An analysis of this event is likely to throw some additional light on the accident on 1st June 2009 between Rio de Janeiro and Paris to the A330-203, flight AF 447.This little-noticed “event” from last month involved a near-duplicate of the conditions in which Air France Flight 447 was lost over the Atlantic in the summer. Except that in this case the Airbus, with 203 passengers and 12 crew, survived. As in the case of Flight 447, the airplane hit severe turbulence-so severe that the flight crew declared a “Mayday” emergency as they were 750 miles southwest of Cape Verde. (No “Mayday” was ever recorded from Flight 447 although judging from the lax performance of some of the air traffic controllers on that night such a call might well have gone unheard.)
Under any circumstances this is pretty astonishing. A flight crew does
not issue distress calls without fearing that the airplane is
jeopardized and that they could well need help and, essentially, that
the controllers should know their exact position over the water. None
of the reports of what happened on the night of November 29 discloses
whether the half hour of severe turbulence caused a problem with the
A330’s automated flight control system. But note that phrase in the BEA
statement: “is likely to throw some additional light” on the
disappearance of Flight 447.
You can say that again. Let’s have more light, and let’s have it shine hard on just what exactly is causing these emergencies.
It seems that in this new episode the flight crew were alert to the high altitude storm cells, normal at this time of the year in the tropical convergence zone of the South Atlantic, that showed up on their radar. Nonetheless the cells included invisible high-velocity winds and extreme fluctuations in temperature that induced the turbulence. If this Airbus, like the A330 of Flight 447, had speed gauges vulnerable to temperature changes, and those gauges began to give false readings to the automated control system, investigators would now have a whole airplane, and a complete digital record, of what happened.
That is a great help, but not much consolation to those of us who wish the BEA, Airbus and Air France would become a good deal more transparent and candid than they have been about the long trail of incidents on A330s in which pilots had to wrest back control from confused computers.
You can say that again. Let’s have more light, and let’s have it shine hard on just what exactly is causing these emergencies.
It seems that in this new episode the flight crew were alert to the high altitude storm cells, normal at this time of the year in the tropical convergence zone of the South Atlantic, that showed up on their radar. Nonetheless the cells included invisible high-velocity winds and extreme fluctuations in temperature that induced the turbulence. If this Airbus, like the A330 of Flight 447, had speed gauges vulnerable to temperature changes, and those gauges began to give false readings to the automated control system, investigators would now have a whole airplane, and a complete digital record, of what happened.
That is a great help, but not much consolation to those of us who wish the BEA, Airbus and Air France would become a good deal more transparent and candid than they have been about the long trail of incidents on A330s in which pilots had to wrest back control from confused computers.
Leave a comment